<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Swords and Sacred Duties by Ladyfae (Ladysaille)</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25701964">Swords and Sacred Duties</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladysaille/pseuds/Ladyfae'>Ladyfae (Ladysaille)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Shadows Beckoning [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 08:35:00</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,881</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25701964</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladysaille/pseuds/Ladyfae</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Willow proves unusually talented with a weapon for the first time. And vampire and witch must decide if they are willing to lose the unique bond they share.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Angel/Willow Rosenberg</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Shadows Beckoning [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1845043</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Swords and Sacred Duties</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters herein. They belong to BVTS and its creators Joss and WB. Don't hurt me for borrowing them. They needed to come out and play...</p><p>Special thank you to Carissa T for the edit.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  
</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>Angel:</strong>
</p><p>Willow dropped the blade, her horrified expression easy to read. She began to shake, and I was at her side before I could remember why I’d been keeping my distance. She folded into my arms with ease, as if the kiss that we shared days prior and the week of separation that followed hadn’t happened. Her arms curled around me, holding on for all she was worth.</p><p>“Take me home,” she whispered into my neck, the warmth of her breath distractingly pleasant.</p><p>Giles had barely formed a protest when Willow lifted her head from its hiding place. She curled her arm through mine and tangled her slender fingers between my own. She stared at Giles. Her expression cool. Her emotions were becoming fainter as the last of her blood slowly left my system. I’d miss it, the connection we shared.</p><p>“You proved your point. I’m some kind of savant with that blade. Only that blade,  Giles. I didn’t suddenly inherit infinite grace and talent with swords in general.” She turned to look at me, her expression worried. “I don’t know what it means, but I’m not a second slayer. I don’t want to know the surest way to kill with it. I don’t want to know anything about it.”</p><p>“Willow, please see reason. This could be important. There could be a prophecy.”</p><p>Willow deflated, she caught my gaze again, and I could almost feel her plea for me to rescue her. I couldn’t. Whatever was happening was important, Her skill with the sword was unexpected, but not unprecedented. Magical swords weren’t all that rare.</p><p>Willow had managed to hold her own against me in our little scrimmage, though it was clear she had liked our battle of blades even less than she enjoyed sparring with the Watcher. Her dislike for combat was unaltered by her increase in skill.</p><p>She sighed and pushed her hair back from her face. The afternoon's exertions had freed numerous red strands from their confines on the back of her head.</p><p>“I wish I’d never picked up that blade.” Her words were forlorn.</p><p>
  <em>If she never picked up that blade, I wouldn’t be here.</em>
</p><p>The words cut deeply. She lifted her head, and our gazes locked, and the room dissolved. Her breath caught, and her expression crumbled. She closed the distance between us, wrapping herself around me so tightly I was glad I didn’t have to breathe. I wrapped my arms around her, fingers digging into her long hair of their own accord. I drew her head back to look into her now tear-filled eyes. Tears like tiny jewels, suspended from her spiky red lashes. I rested my forehead against hers, trying to find words.</p><p>“I didn’t mean it,” she whispered, her expression broken.</p><p>“I know.” I wiped the tears from beneath her eyes. I glanced at Giles, his expression was unreadable. I could imagine what he was thinking. Willow wasn’t one to touch and welcome being touched, but in the past few months, the amount of physical contact between us had gone from zero to the extreme.</p><p>Giles pulled off his glasses, then squeezed the bridge of his nose. “Perhaps,” he said, “it would be best if you did take Willow home. I have been expecting far too much from someone who is not, in fact, the slayer.”</p><p>I nodded and waited as Willow gathered her things. Her expression was oddly closed, where it had been open and sad moments before. Giles watched as we exited the library, arm in arm. I could well imagine the visit and talking-to I’d receive as soon as the Watcher figured out the meaning behind what he saw pass between Willow and me.</p><p>The evening air was quiet. It was dusk, not safe for delicious little humans to be walking alone. Not safe for them to be walking with vampires, either—if the vampire tail we had was any indication. They didn’t approach, and for that I was grateful. I could have fought them off, but I wasn’t sure if Willow’s emotional state could have handled another jarring experience.</p><p>She stopped suddenly and turned to face me. They were only a few blocks from the school, at the crossroads between their homes.</p><p>“My parents aren’t home.” She glanced away from me, uncertain. “Can I stay with you tonight.”</p><p>The tension left my body. “Of course,” I whispered. She was always welcome. We walked toward our house. <em>Our house.</em> The thought brought me up short. Did I really consider it ours? I wasn’t sure when it had happened, but I realized I was hers. Therefore, whatever I had belonged to her as well. The knowledge should have terrified me.</p><p>Her fingers slipped between mine as we walked.</p><p>“What would you like for dinner?” I asked, needing something to say.</p><p>She smiled. The idea that a vampire could, in fact, cook always brought a small smile to her face.</p><p>“Veggie omelet?” She smiled hopefully at me.</p><p>I chuckled. “Whatever my lady wishes.”</p><p>“Whatever I wish, huh?”</p><p>I nodded as we made it to the sidewalk in front of our house. Once inside, she disappeared into the bathroom, and moments later, the sound of the shower running filled the air.</p><p>As she cleaned up, I prepped her omelet. I enjoyed cooking. Food might not exactly be something I hungered for, but the idea that something I had made would sustain Willow made me happy.</p><p>When she returned to the kitchen, freshly showered and smelling like lilacs, I placed the omelet and some toast before her on the table. I grabbed the blackberry jam she enjoyed from the fridge and settled across from her as she dug in.</p><p>“I know you’re not happy about the whole sword thing.” I began. I wasn’t sure where I wanted to take this conversation. I couldn’t shake the feeling that she needed to talk it out, with someone other than Giles, who found the changes the blade wrought in Willow too intriguing to understand how unsettling they might be for my little witch.</p><p>“It reminds me of <em>Need</em> from Mercedes Lackey,” Willow said as she took a drink of orange juice.</p><p>I wracked my brain. Willow had shared with me what she considered a guilty pleasure once. In my head, I could see the covers of several books with white horses with blue eyes and humans of various appearances. I was drawing a blank, but I was sure she’d fill me in.</p><p>“The sword gives the wielder what they lack. So a magic-user would gain fighting skills, and a fighter might gain magical protection. I kept thinking about that today.” She took another bite of the omelet.</p><p>It was as plausible an explanation as any. As soon as Willow had picked up the sword while in Drake’s Lair, she’d been moving differently, reacting differently.</p><p>“I’m not sorry I killed Drake,” Willow said suddenly. “I just wish I’d picked up a different weapon, maybe.”</p><p>“How did you know to take it with us?” I asked curiously. That Night I had not thought to ask, too concerned about her to think beyond the fact that she was safe.</p><p>She finished her omelet, and I realized she was not so much stalling as attempting to gather her thoughts. She shook her head, and I couldn’t help but wonder what she was recalling.</p><p>“When he first caught me. I saw the blade when they brought me in. I can’t explain, but it was like it was the only thing on the table. I noticed it every time.” She shivered. “He bled me, cut me, drank me, and it disgusted me.” She pushed the plate away and got to her feet. Her hands needed a vocation. I knew her well enough now to understand that. She moved toward the sink and began to wash the dishes.</p><p>“I could feel you,” she said after a moment. “I didn’t know what it was at first. I didn’t understand that the sensations I was getting were from you.”</p><p>She set her plate into the dish rack, and I nearly grabbed the mug she began to wash before recalling that I was being foolish.</p><p>“Then you came for me. I thought I was imagining things,” she said as she placed the cup in the rack. She rinsed and dried her hands before returning to me. “I knew I had to take the sword because it told me to.”</p><p>Her expression was serious, as if she expected me to discount what she said. She reached out to me, letting her hand brush my cheek. I leaned into the touch. Her fingers slipped from my cheek to ruffle my hair above my ear.</p><p>“You don’t think I imagined it?”</p><p>“No, if you say it spoke to you, it spoke to you.” She wasn’t prone to flights of fancy and considering what had happened since she brought the sword to Giles, it made a kind of odd sense. Especially since the blade made little impact on anyone else’s skills. It appeared in some way to be keyed to Willow.</p><p>“It was like it knew who I was,” Willow said. “As if it had been waiting for me to pick it up. Drake was distracted by the fact that I was handling it. I think he knew something about it. It’s origins or purpose.”</p><p>I nodded. It was possible. Drake had a love for the esoteric and unusual, and if the sword held an interest, then the woman who wielded it with such skill would have been even more intriguing to him. I was grateful he was dust. “Perhaps, the books taken from his lair will shed some light on the blade.” I offered, I imagined she had already looked, but it was all I could think to say as my mind whirled, there was something disturbingly familiar about this entire situation. Though the redhead from memory would never have stood as close to me as Willow currently was.</p><p>I wrapped my arms around her waist, drawing her against my body. Her gaze met mine curiously. I settled my hands palm down on her lower back and gently began to knead the tense muscles there. She sighed softly, pressing into my touch. The blood bond between us was weak. It would be gone in a few days, and I’d be alone again. I tightened my arms around her, nuzzled her neck, the temptation to reset the bond roared through me, and my teeth ached with the wanting.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>Willow:</strong>
</p><p>Cool breath bathed my throat. The waning bond between us shimmered with turmoil. This wasn’t about the blood. It was about the bond the blood brought into being. Want curled ruthless talons into Angel’s body, warring with his need to keep me safe. He wouldn’t bite, he wanted to desperately, but he wanted me safe more.</p><p>I tangled my fingers in his dark locks, trailing over the nape of his neck. A low rumbling purr started beneath my fingers. He nuzzled against me, the sound thrumming against my throat. I turned my head and lifted my chin, offering him the pale length of my neck. A shiver passed down my spine as the rumble of his purr faltered. I fed the bond between us as best I could with calm acceptance. I didn’t fully comprehend why he wanted what he wanted, but I was prepared to give it.</p><p>The only fear that reared inside me was that it would hurt. His teeth tearing into my wrist had been terrible, and I imagined my throat would be somehow worse.</p><p>“Willow,” he said, his voice ragged, control in tatters. If I didn’t pull away now, he’d bite. Where terror should have flooded me, there was only sweet anticipation. My craving, wanting, twining with Angel’s dragged a whimper from my throat. His mouth brushed over my skin, his tongue darted out to taste my flesh, and there was the barest prick of fangs as he waited for me to speak.</p><p>“Yes.” I imagined what my voice must have sounded like to him, small and breathy. Not my voice, someone else’s. I kept my fingers in his hair, holding him against me. “Take what you need, until we figure out another way,” I said.</p><p>I had no idea if there was another way or if his need would diminish as time went on. I accepted he needed this bond, and the weeks that we’d been connected assured that I was aware of how precarious his situation was. I wanted it too. This bond. He lifted his head and brushed a tender kiss across my mouth. Just a thanks, soft, and sweet.</p><p>He nuzzled against my throat, gently tasting my skin, fangs nipped again. He drew back suddenly, dark eyes, limned with gold, searching mine. He trembled, visibly fighting against the desire to take what I offered. His gaze stole my breath as it drifted from my eyes to my lips, the gold growing more intense. He drew his right hand up my back, curled it at the nape of my neck, and drew me inexorably closer.</p><p>“And if this is what I need?”</p><p>Oh my, his lips brushed teasingly against mine as he spoke. His voice was a low, hungry growl. My mind blanked as his lips lingered over mine with the barest hint of pressure.</p><p>“Angel …what …” That wasn’t my voice. I sounded like I couldn’t get enough air to form words and Angel … Angel suddenly slanted his mouth over mine, taking full advantage of my parted lips to explore me with a recklessness that left me gasping. His teeth bit into my bottom lip, a soft nip, a teasing lick of tongue that had me clinging to him.</p><p>“Need you.”</p><p>This was more than the bond. This was something I hadn’t allowed myself to think of. With that strained confession and his desperately clutching hands, he gave me the power to hurt him. To push him away, to deny him. I drew in a breath. Pressed my mouth to his gently.</p><p>“You’ve got me.” </p><p>The smile that curved his lips at my words was equal parts beautiful and devastating in its vulnerability. He was mine, and I was keeping him. I urged him back to my throat.  His mouth opened against me, all cool breath and teasing tongue against flesh, before his arms tightened, holding me steady as his fangs slipped through my skin. I gasped and clung to him. One hand kept me in place, the other rubbed low on my back. His caress calmed and warmed me.  Heat pooled in my middle, and I wiggled, uncomfortably aware of my body’s response.</p><p>He drew on my throat, gentle, and eased his fangs from me after only a few brief moments. His mouth moved over the marks, his tongue swirling against the flesh and slightest fissure of pain whispered through me and then disappeared. I knew the wounds would be gone, but I couldn’t help but wonder about the bruise that was sure to be there. I’d never needed to be skilled in the application of foundation before.</p><p>He lifted his head from my throat, and our gazes met, I stared into his demon’s visage without fear. The golden eyes held a strange combination of tenderness and hunger, his wrinkled forehead tempted my fingers. I reached up and brushed my fingers lightly against it, curious as to the different textures of his skin. His mouth curved into a smile, which looked somewhat silly due to the two elongated fangs that pressed into his bottom lip.</p><p>I pressed my mouth lightly to his, uncertain. Our newly strengthened connection overflowed with surprise and hard hunger. His mouth moved against mine with barely restrained aggression. I could taste my blood, and Angel, and something that must have been the demon as his tongue tangled with mine. When his mouth finally drifted away, I panted for breath. Jesus, warning labels, Angel should have several of them. </p><p>He pressed a gentle kiss to my mouth and eased away without deepening it. Our gazes caught and held. A a pleasant tingle worked down my spine as he tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, his fingers teasing.</p><p>“Angel?”</p><p>“Hmm?” he hummed his response.</p><p>Angel tightened his hold when I tried to move away from him. He stood and swept me up into his arms with unsurprising ease. I curled against him, trying to catch my breath and ease my chaotic thoughts. He settled us on the couch in the living room. Urging me to rest against his chest. His arms slid around me, and I glanced up at him. He smiled gently at me. I wanted to ask him exactly what was going on, but the words wouldn’t come, I was almost afraid to know.</p><p>His hands smoothed over my arms, and I tried to push away the unease that was tightening in my stomach. “Willow, relax, love,” he whispered against my ear. “We’re just going to watch a movie.”</p><p>Once I relaxed back into his body, he grabbed the remote, and the tv came to life. The images that eventually moved across the screen made me giggle despite myself. <em>Much Ado About Nothing.</em> I glanced at him over my shoulder. He shrugged and hugged me closer without speaking. </p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>